Richard Sherman was far from a household name before last week’s NFC Championship game. Other than avid football fans and Seattle locals, few knew the All-Pro cornerback for the Seattle Seahawks. After last Sunday’s game, though, Sherman became the talk of the country, as all eyes turned to him. From tweets to memes to articles on every major website, almost everyone in the media has been talking about the Stanford graduate this past week, critiquing his every move.
Sherman’s popularity on Google reached a maximum score of 100 since his infamous interview with Erin Andrews. Prior to last Sunday, “Richard Sherman” was a relatively unpopular search on Google. According to Google trends, Sherman never received a score higher than 5 (out of 100). After his rant on TV, that number sky rocketed to the max 100.
Most of these Google searches were regarding the interview, as the general public, not just in America but all over the world, wanted to watch it over and over again. Key words such as “interview” and “Crabtree” were included to find the interview even quicker. The interview gained so much attention, that even Erin Andrews and Michael Crabtree’s names began to trend on Google.
Sherman’s rant also gained popularity on Twitter, as his name began to trend almost instantly after the interview. Sherman’s first tweet after the game (shown below) received over 76,000 retweets and 47,000 favorites, by far his most popular tweet. Others on Twitter posted their own reactions, pictures, and thoughts about the interview. Soon enough, seemingly everyone in the country was talking about Sherman.
A lion doesn’t concern himself with the opinions of a sheep.
— Richard Sherman (@RSherman_25) January 20, 2014
While some say “any publicity is good publicity,” some people did not take kindly to Sherman’s postgame words. All over the Internet and throughout the news, Sherman was referred to as a “thug,” and was on the wrong side of many racial slurs. This however, is not the first time Sherman has experienced national backlash from the nation’s public. Earlier in the year, Sherman’s interview with Skip Bayless generated a negative reaction as well. This time, Sherman wrote a sophisticated piece on his reaction to his statements on his blog. His article was thought provoking and provided a different side to Richard Sherman. In this article, and others that Sherman writes for Peter King, Sherman presents himself as an eloquent and thoughtful man.
Sherman, who graduated from Stanford with a 3.9 GPA, is not like many other football players. He is extremely well educated, started his own brand, and appears in various commercials. He is a well-rounded individual who is self aware of his actions both on and off the field.
While Sherman did experience some national backlash and was criticized greatly, CNN Money reports that Sherman stands to make $5 million in endorsements from his post game rant. Including money from endorsements, Sherman will also have increased revenue on his personal clothing line and website. While Sherman’s comments may have been ignorant, obnoxious, disrespectful, many in the media have actually supported the All Pro cornerback over the past week. After people have learned more about Sherman, where he’s from, who he is, it becomes apparent that these postgame comments were not the words of a “thug” but rather a player supporting his team and himself. Even Erin Andrew supported Sherman after the game saying about the interview, “it was awesome.”
First feature done for @NFLonFOX Super Bowl pregame show @RSherman_25..off to Denver pic.twitter.com/EhzG0gznsY
— Erin Andrews (@ErinAndrews) January 23, 2014
And just for fun, here are some little kids impersonating Sherman’s post game interview.